


Little Red

by raiyana



Series: The Skin-Changer Chronicles [2]
Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms, The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, Tumblr: ImaginexHobbit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-25
Updated: 2017-08-25
Packaged: 2018-12-19 14:45:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,378
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11899944
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raiyana/pseuds/raiyana
Summary: What does it take to turn a heart away from the path of self-destruction?When Radagast's rabbits rebel, he will find the answer to that question, along with a new friend.Alternatively, the story of a 'Wizard's Whim' (they don't all have to do with Hobbits and adventures), a chance meeting, and a small family.





	Little Red

**Author's Note:**

> For Roya over on Tumblr who asked me to write this imagine ;)  
> Imagine Radagast being your crazy Grandfather and you going to pay him visits dressed like Little Red Riding Hood with Beorn escorting you in his bear form.
> 
>  
> 
> Yes, you should totally imagine this as child!Merida... ;)

A child was crying. It was not something heard every day this far from any settlement of men. At first, Radagast would have ignored it, thinking it was simply a group of travelers with a wailing baby. The rabbits, however, had different plans. Turning his sled around – Radagast tried to convince and cajole them back to their original path, but when the animals did not listen, the Brown wizard resigned himself to investigating the mystery of the crying child. If nothing else, at least Sebastian would stop giving him looks and telling him they had a duty to take care of things in these parts. Radagast didn’t have much to do with the _people_ -part of these parts, however, that was Olorin’s shtick, Radagast was quite content to care for the creatures of Yavannah’s making – the ones whose tongues most people could not hear, in fact. Telling Sebastian as much did not make him any less insistent, however, and Radagast never had found it easy to deny the hedgehog when he pouted like that.

Coming closer to the wailing sound, Radagast frowned. He could smell something burning; _fleshy_ somethings burning. Not a good sign. When the rabbits burst into the clearing, they came to an abrupt halt – long experience with the rabbits had taught Radagast how to deal with sudden stops without flying off his sled, but in his surprise, he nearly faltered. A large bonfire was burning, yes, and beside it a smaller one. What surprised him was not the wailing infant, the sounds coming from a small mouth in a red face in a blanket-covered basket, but the _bear_ dragging orc corpses onto the burning pile. The bear growled. In just a single leap, it had placed itself… between the baby and the sled, standing there as though to protect the helpless child. Radagast stared.

“You are a Walker,” he stated, no doubt in his heart. “I thought they were all dead?” he then added, confusion seeping into his mind. As he stared, the bear sniffed the air once, before nodding at him. With a shudder and the sound of popping bones and joints, the bear became a Man, larger than any Man Radagast had seen since his last run-in with the Walkers; nearly five centuries before.

“Who are you, to know what I am?” the Walker snarled.

“Radagast, the Brown. One of the five Istari.” Radagast bowed. Sebastian copied the move, falling off his shoulder with a squeak. Radagast easily caught the hedgehog, putting him back where he belonged.

“What’s an Istari?” the Man asked next, his stance still threatening. Behind him, the child’s cries had died off into whimpers.

“Wizards sent to guard this world against the forces of Darkness,” Radagast explained carefully. The Walker nodded. “What happened here?” Radagast dared to ask, though it was probably obvious.

“Orcs.” The Walker growled, hatred clear in his eyes as he stared with satisfaction as the burning corpses. “They attacked the Men’s camp in the night. I heard the first screams and came to investigate. They had killed all but the mother by then.” For a moment, he looked sad. “I slew them, in my bear skin, but the mother had died from her wounds by the time I caught the last one.”

“What will you do with the babe?” Radagast asked carefully. It was a human child, and though Walkers were related to the race of Men, they were not wholly Men.

“I had thought to bring her to a settlement, leave her there. Someone would find her and care for her.”

“There are no settlements of Men closer than Gondor,” Radagast pointed out. The Walker scowled. He would be loath to leave whatever territory he had claimed as his own; probably further up the Anduin, Radagast guessed, since he had not seen the Walker in these parts near the south of Mirkwood and the borders of Lórien. “Perhaps you should take the child; raise her.” He proposed.

“Raise her? I have no home,” the Walker claimed. “I have but one purpose, wizard: the killing of Orcs as vengeance for my slaughtered people until the time comes for my soul to join the Hunt Eternal alongside my kin!”

“Perhaps… and perhaps _she_ will bring you a different purpose. Protecting those who are weaker is in your blood, is it not…Scildere?” Radagast had not spoken the title in more than five centuries, but he knew he had guessed right when the Bear-Walker roared angrily.

“What do you know, wizard!” he snarled, but Radagast was not afraid. Sebastian hissed at the Walker, which made him laugh.

“Enough to know that a bear of your size would have been Scildere[1], if not Hláford[2] of your own clan, Walker,” he said placidly, lighting his pipe. The Walker growled.

“Why don’t you take her. You seem used to taking care of weak things,” he snarled, throwing Sebastian a smug look.

“I think I shall look in on you from time to time, yes,” Radagast said, “but I believe the Valar placed this child in your path for a reason, Walker,” he smiled, feeling the right path open up before him like a flower turning its face towards the sun. “Now, come, come. We will leave this place and journey to my home. There you will rest and feed the child, surely she is hungry. Then we will begin to find you somewhere to live. There’s a lovely little spot a bit further to the north that would be perfect for a cabin.”

 

* * *

 

 

“Fæder! Fæder!” the little girl cried, picking her red cloak from the wall hook. Beorn smiled, helping her put on the new garment, delivered by one of Radagast’s bird friends for her last Finding-Day, the day he secretly considered her birthday, even if it was simply the day she had been found by a lonely bear and a crazy wizard. “Let’s go, Fæder, let’s go, let’s go, let’s go!” Dancing around him, her smile wider than her face, little Álmbera was jumping with excitement.

“Have you packed the food?” Beorn asked in a low purring rumble. Álmbera – her name chosen to suit both her ‘father’ and her ‘grandfather’ – nodded solemnly, holding up a basket she had woven herself. It was obviously made by a child, but Álmbera had been so proud of it Beorn had not the heart to tell her whatever she put in it was likely to fall through the gaps in the weave. Instead, he had panicked and then helped her stitch a piece of an old tunic to the inside of the basket, which was now filled with small seedcakes she had helped bake this morning. “Get outside then, Little Red,” he murmured, his big hand coming down to ruffle her red curls. Her hair clashed horribly with the new cloak, but Radagast had never been exactly sane in Beorn’s eyes, and if wearing it made Álmbera happy, he’d simply have to put up with the eye-watering combination.

“Yes, Fæder!” she shouted, running out of the newly carved door – Beorn’s own winter project – as he turned and closed the latch behind him. Beorn let the change claim him, nosing Álmbera’s small back and making her sweet laughter ring out, startling the placidly grass-chewing goat who bleated her annoyance at her. Álmbera carefully clambered onto the big bear’s back – Beorn had a flash of himself doing just the same to his own mama when he was a cub – and they were off towards Rhosgobel, and Radagast who would be waiting for his treats in the house Beorn swore was held together by magic alone. The giant tree that continually grew through the small building made it almost impossible for anyone larger than Álmbera to fit inside, and he had promised to help Radagast build an extension of sorts along the back, while Álmbera amused herself playing with Sebastian. Beorn shook his head mentally, not for the first time wondering how his life of vengeance and death had been turned around by a wizard, a glaring hedgehog and a small babe crying for her dead mother. The bear smiled, listening to the little girl chattering happily along until she wore herself out and fell asleep on his broad back.

 

 

[1] Protector

[2] Lord


End file.
